But none of this is a new "thing". The Romney's have sponsored Jan for 10 years and Rafalca has been around for almost as long. She competed at the FEI World Cup Finals in Las Vegas in 2009, which is a competition at a similar level to the Olympics.

And I don't think $77,000 for upkeep for one year is reasonable, especially with Jan campaigning for the Olympics I think costs closer to half a million are more realistic. So people should not really be complaining about that IMO!! I think overall the publicity has been good for the sport and in 3 years no one is going to remember "Oh yea Mitt Romney spent $77,000 on that horse" but probably more like "Oh year that's the prancey thing with horses" when they hear dressage.

I noticed that the coverage of the equestrian teams has been pretty much zero in the mainstream media. If Ann Romney wasn't involved the coverage would be less than zero, so if this makes people aware, and maybe even draws in a few more participants, that's a good thing.

The people who only have negative things to say about our sport probably only have negative things to say about everything else in life as well.

My observation has been that interspersing political commentary in the dressage world has forced the dressage riders to take them selves less seriously. Among the riders I know it has also encouraged discussions about the merits of dressage, the difference between dressage showing and dressage (as the word directly translates to, training). I have spent hours discussing the Romeny's contributions to the world of dressage, the evolution of dressage from the romans to new movement of western dressage.

I think the best thing that has come from Rafalca's competing in the Olympics is now "dressage" is a household word.

Register Now

In order to be able to post messages on the The Horse Forum forums, you must first register.

Already have a Horse Forum account?
Members are allowed only one account per person at the Horse Forum, so if you've made an account here in the past you'll need to continue using that account. Please do not create a new account or you may lose access to the Horse Forum. If you need help recovering your existing account, please Contact Us. We'll be glad to help!

New to the Horse Forum?Please choose a username you will be satisfied with using for the duration of your membership at the Horse Forum. We do not change members' usernames upon request because that would make it difficult for everyone to keep track of who is who on the forum. For that reason, please do not incorporate your horse's name into your username so that you are not stuck with a username related to a horse you may no longer have some day, or use any other username you may no longer identify with or care for in the future.

User Name:

Password

Please enter a password for your user account. Note that passwords are case-sensitive.

Password:

Confirm Password:

Email Address

Please enter a valid email address for yourself.

Email Address:

OR

Log-in

User Name

Password

Remember Me?

Human Verification

In order to verify that you are a human and not a spam bot, please enter the answer into the following box below based on the instructions contained in the graphic.

Old Thread Warning

This thread is more than 90 days old. When a thread is this old, it is often better to start a new thread rather than post to it. However, If you feel you have something of value to add to this particular thread, you can do so by checking the box below before submitting your post.I am aware that this is an old thread and I want to revive it rather than starting a new thread.